


The Invitation

by 3HobbitsInATrenchcoat



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Academia, Blatant Property Destruction, Educated Stan Pines, Ford Pines is occasionally a jerk, Gen, Made Up Science, Memory Loss (Mentioned), Mystery Trio, Professor Stan AU, Revenge, Robot Dinosaurs, Robots, Stan O' War II, Stan Pines has a fanclub, Stan Pines is Tired, actions have consequences, older mystery trio, three nerds one braincell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-26
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:13:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26125558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3HobbitsInATrenchcoat/pseuds/3HobbitsInATrenchcoat
Summary: Stanley Pines spent 30 long years trying to bring his brother back from the other side of the portal. At some point he reached a point where he needed to further his personal education. A decades-long pursuit of knowledge culminates in brotherly bonding and... robots?Yeah, those are definitely robots.
Relationships: Fiddleford H. McGucket & Ford Pines & Stan Pines
Comments: 84
Kudos: 106
Collections: Genuary 2021





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> I meant this to be a one-shot, maybe a couple thousand words... and it got away from me. I'm going to be cleaning it up and posting the full thing over the course of the next week or so. 
> 
> This starts out serious and gets progressively sillier in a kind of... direct reflection of the show itself to be honest. Enjoy!

The letter arrived on a crisp autumn afternoon towards the very end of tourist season. The pristine white envelope embossed with a fancy crest seemed out of place among the other bills and letters in the pile.

Stan pulled it out with a frown, flipping it over in his hands. The paper felt nice, possibly linen, and embossing looked impressively expensive to the untrained eye. Fortunately, Stan's eye was trained and he scoffed at the cheap metallic paint they'd opted for instead of a true embossing ink.

All the appearance of class, none of the expense. Typical.

With a quick slide of his pocket knife the top of the envelope split open and a creamy matte page slid out into his waiting hand. It felt expensive but Stan knew better. It was the same cheap office store paper he'd get if he was trying to shmoose some harried unsuspecting scientist.

Well, Ford may have fallen for this kind of nonsense once upon a time, but Stan wasn't going to. Honestly, what kind of institution expended so much effort on looking so cheaply expensive... he flipped the page open and his thoughts ground to an understanding halt.

“West Coast Tech formally invites you to their 40th annual Inventioneer Symposium.” Stan's carefully neutral expression pulled downward into a frown as he skimmed the rest of the short letter.

“ _Dear Dr. Lee Pines PhD,_

_It has come to our attention that you have invented some small but unique pieces for your exhibit. We would be delighted if you would come present them at our symposium, a very generous and unique opportunity...”_

Stan stopped reading. The rest of the letter was probably a bunch of ass-kissing drivel mixed with barely disguised superiority. Honestly, he'd wonder how they got his address except that it was on all of his papers and research requests he'd had to do over the years.

Leaving the rest of the mail on the kitchen counter to be dealt with later, Stan thumped down the hallway and into his office. In other dimensions the space may have been a cluttered mess of half-finished taxidermy and pizza boxes but in this dimension... it was the exact same thing, just made a little more cramped by the full bookshelves lining the walls and a little more bright by the sunlight glinting off of several large frames opposite the windows. Stan ignored all of it on his way to his desk, shuffling papers around until he found a blank sheet of his own monogrammed letterhead with only one coffee stain. He considered making a few more on purpose, but there was petty and then there was vindictive. West Coast Tech didn't deserve the energy to be a complete tool.

Not today anyway.

His hand shook a little as he put pen to paper, but his hands always shook when writing. Stan figured it was all the youthful punching he'd done back in the day but he was never sure. As long as his hands were steady while tinkering, he didn't much care.

“ _To Whom it May Concern,_

_I'm not interested in your fancy college elbow rubbing. I got this far without your help, not to mention you hurt a friend of mine very deeply. I know that you have a reputation for taking whatever doo-dads you get your grubby little hands on and I worked far too hard on my gadgets to let them slip through my fingers. Nice try, but no. Lose my address._

_Dr. Lee Pines”_

Satisfied, Stan sat back and surveyed his handiwork, smile faltering as his eyes flick over “a friend of mine.” He wondered what Ford would think of him, turning down West Coast Tech like this, but even without his precious experiment they should have accepted a bright young mind.

And for them to come after Stan later, even without being aware of the connection, was just salt in a still-open wound.

The brief pleasure of telling off the educational powerhouse wore off as quickly as it had come. Stan sunk back in his chair, rubbing at his eyes under his relatively new glasses. Weren't those a nice reminder of Ford every time he looked in the mirror, right? He could feel his mood souring as he abruptly stood, stuffing the letter into an envelope to be sent at the first available opportunity. The invitation itself got shoved in the bottom of the drawer to be swiftly forgotten by it's recipient, who strode out of the office without another backward glance.


	2. Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The balance between the older Pines twins is tenuous at best. For all his intelligence, Ford sure makes a lot of assumptions...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said in a comment on the last chapter, there are some time skips in this work. This bit takes place sometime in the middle of the weeks after the portal's activation but before weirdmageddon.

“What is this, Stanley?” Ford's hand, containing what looked vaguely like paper, slammed onto the kitchen table in front of his brother. Stan blinked up from where he was carefully soldering together some kind of eye mechanism for a new exhibit piece.

“Dunno, can't see through your hand,” Stan went back to squinting at tiny wires and Ford let out an aggrieved sigh. He removed his hand from the paper and pointed accusingly at the gilt lettering.

“What is an invitation to the esteemed West Coast Tech Inventioneer Symposium from 2005 doing crumpled up in your desk?” Ford sounded a little frantic. “I was long-gone by then what could they possibly have wanted.” There was a long uncomfortable pause. “You... you didn't _go_ did you? Please tell me you didn't go.”

“Moses, Ford. Give a man a chance to breathe.” Stan picked up the letter with an air of disgust. “First off, why were you in my desk?” Ford started muttering something about looking for a working pen and Stan held up a hand. “Just, ask next time. Some of those drawers are booby trapped.”

Stan took a second to really look at his brother and then back at the invitation, which if he's honest he barely remembers. But he did know it wasn't addressed to Ford. “Did you even read past the top of the page? If you had you would know this wasn't addressed to you.”

Ford's brow furrowed further and he snatched the letter out of Stan's hands, “Who else would it be addressed to? 'Dr. Lee Pines'? What kind of joke is this, Stanley?” His face, previously pale, grew pink with anger. “I can understand you taking my name, but my degrees? I _earned those_. You have no right to claim...”

He stopped at the sudden flash of answering fury in his brother's eyes. “I didn't touch your precious degrees, you idiot. Did you even bother looking around my office while you were snooping through my desk?”

Stan knew he hadn't looked. If he had he would have seen the wall of steadily more complicated degrees by the door: A very late GED, a couple bachelor's degrees in business and science, a few mechanics-focused vocational degrees, a masters each in applied physics and mechanical engineering, a fraught and hard-earned PhD in mechanical engineering, and a recent PhD in Sociology. It hadn't been entirely ethical to use tourists as observational subjects but... people never fully read the waiver they signed so the grant board hadn't been too picky.

It had been refreshing to study something he was actually interested in and that was NOT what Ford needed to know about right now. Stan pushed his project away from himself and stood up with a sigh. “C'mon, Sixer. Lemme show you something.”

Ford almost let his anger flare again, but curiosity won out and he followed his brother instead. For a moment he thought Stan was going to lead him back to the office, but instead the pair went into the gift shop. Stan grabbed one of the Mr. Mystery bobbleheads and tossed it in Ford's direction. “I know you hate these things but take a good hard look at one.”

“It's a bobblehead. I don't need to take a closer look to know that.” Stan just leveled a glare at him and he rolled his eyes. “Alright fine.” He turned the bobblehead in his hands and looked closely just to appease his brother.

At first it looked like a normal bobblehead. Big head, small body, bouncy spring. The base was heavy to offset the head but... Ford looked closer. There was a thumb-size imprint right by the left foot. He slid his own thumb into the indent and nearly lept into the air as Stan's voice rang through the silent shop.

“THANK YOU FOR VISITING THE MYSTERY SHACK. I'M YOUR HOST MR. MYSTERY. YOU DISCOVERED DAILY MYSTERY FACTS. PLEASE STATE YOUR TIME ZONE.”

What the fuck. Ford looked up at Stan, who waved his hand as if to say “go on.”

“Pacific time. And, this thing doesn't even have speakers, how is it so loud?” He flipped it over in his hands. “It doesn't have a battery either, how is it powered?”

“PACIFIC TIME REGISTERED” shrieked the bobblehead, and Ford nearly dropped it. “YOUR FACT OF THE DAY IS: A GROUP OF FERRETS IS CALLED A BUSINESS.”

A chuckle broke the following silence. “Now that it knows your time zone, you'll get a new fact at noon every day until you turn it off. Originally I was gonna have the little guy tailor facts to the listener but the programming for that was just way too much. Also I couldn't study the results without some major ethical violations so the grant committee wouldn't fund it. Anyway, that's not what you should be looking at. You can take it apart, I've got loads of these things.”

Ford hooked his fingernail into a plastic seam and started methodically separating the pieces across the gift shop counter. Stan kept talking, leaning opposite him and pointing out various bits as he laid them out.

“If you'd actually read that piece of drivel, you woulda seen that they specifically requested some of my 'small but unique pieces' for their corporate-driven ass-kissery. It's been back to the drawing board a few times since but this fellow was probably one of the things they were referring to. Course, he couldn't say as much back then, that's a recent addition I was hoping would highlight some other stuff, but he's got a self-winding miniature mechanical battery keeping the voice box going.” Stan pokes at a few tiny leaf springs that Ford has extracted from the inside of the disproportionately large head. “You stick this sucker on your dashboard and you are guaranteed near infinite charge from the simple motion of the road.”

Ford stared at him with barely disguised disbelief, but Stan didn't notice. He chuckled to himself, “early models had a tendency to overheat and melt, but the next line probably will have some kind of charge port to offset the extra energy. Mabel gave me that idea at the beginning of summer because her phone kept dying...” He shakes his head. “What'll the kids think of next?”

Stan looked up and finally registered Ford's slack jaw and shocked expression. He sighed. “Look, Mister-I-Have-Twelve-PhDs, is it really so surprising I can have an idea of my own every once in a while?”

“But,” Ford finally sputtered, looking down at the scattered mechanical pieces and back up at his brother's tired face. “You didn't even graduate high school! I know you fixed the portal but you had my blueprints, which should have been simple to follow and took you three decades. I don't understand.”

Stan's shoulders slumped, but his tone was defensive. “Sure, I hadn't graduated high school when you invited me into your house of horrors, but a lot can change in 30 years. I didn't just continue on my merry way without some form of formal education. There is fuck-all to do in this hick town between the months of September and April and I couldn't put together your multi-dimensional mess of a puzzle with one-third of the instructions and no scientific knowledge. Of _course_ I went back to school. And for your information, I only got the other two journals three weeks ago. I did most of the work with, let me reiterate here, one-third of the instructions!”

He was shouting again. He knew he was shouting again but he just couldn't help it. He could feel the angry tears welling up in his eyes and that just would not do. With an irritated huff he swept the bits of bobblehead into a box for later reassembly and started back towards the kitchen, pausing for a moment at the door.

“Look, I didn't go to their stupid symposium for a lot of reasons. Mostly because they blew you off, but also because I can smell a scam at a hundred paces. If you really want to know what I was doing with my time, go take a closer look at my office. I'll disable the booby traps.”

Then he was gone, padding down the dark hallway and leaving his brother alone with his thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After this every chapter gets progressively longer, lol oops.
> 
> I love comments! I also love screaming about my favorite old men! You can comment here or talk to me on my tumblr (link listed in profile).


	3. Part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After all is done and the twins are finally enjoying their well-deserved relaxation... a ghost of mistakes past appears in their mailbox.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah yes, finally some plot (and another time skip).

The second invitation arrived in a far different time and place. Stan and Ford had rigged a PO box with a miniaturized wormhole and didn't even have to be on land to get their letters. So they were sitting pretty in the middle of The Gulf of Mexico when Stan brought the weekly stack out onto the deck.

“Theoretical Physics Monthly for you,” he said, handing over the thick journal. “Let me steal it when you're done, there's an article by Dr. Fredrik in there and I have to write him a rebuttal on principle. The man laughed in my face a few years ago, so now I've earned the right to be petty.”

“What on earth did he laugh at you about?” Ford flipped open to the table of contents but Dr. Fredrik's article looked like some standard quantum model analysis, nothing fancy worth rebutting. “Is this even worth your time?”

“Oh, it's plenty worth my time. He somehow found out I didn't start higher education until I was well into my 30s and figured the late bloomer was good for a laugh. So now I find minor inconsistencies in his work to irritate him.” Stan flipped through the rest of the mail, tossing his own journal into the empty deck chair and scoffing at the junk mail that was left.

“Hey, wanna buy a...” he cut off, and Ford looked up to see his brother frowning thoughtfully at a plain white envelope in his hand.

“What is it?” Ford knew it could be any number of things. Old grievances come to haunt his brother, forgotten debts coming to collect their due, that one paper he wrote while stoned out of his gourd about simple tricks and the collective human psyche. Little things.

Stan merely hummed under his breath and held out the unopened envelope. “You do it, I got the last one. 's only fair.” Ford took the envelope, glancing down at the familiar tacky metallic seal, and suppressed a laugh as Stan grumbled. “Shoulda never come back from the dead and got my academic papers in order. How the fuck did they find us?”

Ripping into the envelope, Ford pulled out the cheap invitation within. He cleared his throat and read it aloud, much to Stan's groaning dismay.

“ _Doctors Stanford and Stanley Pines,_

_We would be honored if you could come present at our 50 th annual Inventioneer Symposium. Dr. Stanley, we understand that we were instructed to lose your old address but since you are operating under a new address and a new name we felt that this might be a good opportunity to let bygones be bygones and afford you the unique opportunity of displaying some of your more intricate mechanical wonders. Dr. Stanford, your work on wormhole theory has not gone unnoticed and there are many eager inventors waiting to hear you speak on the matter._

_There is the small matter of neither of you having ever attended our symposium before, but we will forgive that oversight just this once in the name of furthering science for the masses. Please respond ASAP._

_Warm regards,_

_The West Coast Tech Symposium Committee”_

Stan had sunk down into his deck chair with a thousand yard stare and his lips twitching in what Ford can only assume is an attempt not to laugh. “I made the call last time, Poindexter. They wronged you, not me, but trust me when I say they are nothing but a big ol' heap of trouble.”

“Well, it could have been more condescending.” Ford folds the invitation in half with a sharp crease. “I am a little offended for your sake that they ignored your wishes, but I think we should go.”

His brother's startled gaze snapped up to meet his own. “What.” His voice croaked out flat and surprised.

“You know, with all his new patents... Fiddleford probably got an invitation as well. We should give him a call.” Ford rose from his chair and paced the deck a couple times before rounding on Stan with a crafty gleam in his eye. “We have an opportunity here, Stanley. Let's waste their fucking time.”

Stan, who had looked more confused with every passing second, blinked once and then his smile grew a little sharper. “I like the sound of that.”

\-----

One call to Fidds later and they were plotting a course for Oregon. Sure they might be a little earlier than usual but that gave them more time to plan.

Fiddleford had indeed received an invitation, just as irritatingly formal and vaguely condescending as the one sent to the Pines twins. He said he would draw up some designs for them all to go over once they got into town.

Stan was not one bit encouraged by the fact that the man chuckled while he said that, or by the way Ford muttered “it's a war meeting, Fidds” under his breath. With a resigned sigh, Stan shoved their positive response back through the wormhole to the post office. The lingering scent of paper dust and stamp glue wafted back at him and he scrunched his nose in distaste.

“We have got to figure out how to filter air out of that wormhole, there is no way the cross-contamination is good for specimens we want to send to the shack.” He shut the box with a thump, resetting the dial on top to neutralize the effect. After the incident with the poor postal worker early on, they had learned their lessons.

“I find the smell of the post office encouraging,” offered Ford from where he was taking his turn at the helm. Stan raised an eyebrow at him and his shoulders dropped minutely as he continued. “The portal... or really any of the dimensional rifts, they only let larger solid matter through. As much as I am aware that our wormhole technology is merely a simpler term for miniaturized quantum entanglement gluing together two points in a single fixed dimension you have to admit it...”

“Feels similar,” finished Stanley, voice flat.

“Exactly,” said Ford, staring straight ahead with tension settling across his shoulders like an unwelcome cloak. “So as much as the post office makes me sneeze, and as much as I worry our samples might be getting contaminated with some new strain of stamp fungus, I think I'd like to leave the box as is for now. Maybe someday we can revisit it when I'm not so jumpy.”

“Yeah, alright, that's completely understandable.” Stan settled back down at his worktable, sweeping together the mechanical bits of his next tourist bait nonsense. He stared at them for a moment before adjusting his glasses and grabbing a fresh sheet of paper for a new blueprint. He made a few half-hearted sketches in silence before groaning and setting his pencil down with a thump.

“Lemme take over, I need to not stare at my own equations for a while.” Ford surrendered the helm with a concerned look but Stan shrugged it off. “No thin' bad, just having a hard time deciding what I want to cover at the symposium. It has to be something I don't mind them stealing. Maybe one of my older inventions...” He trails off, staring at the blue horizon and Ford relaxes.

Early on in their journeys, Stan had stared unseeing at the work in his hands more often than he'd care to admit. It had taken a long time to recover those parts of his mind and Ford had spent a rather alarming amount of time trawling through old academic journals for his brother's byline.

He had been surprised by what he found.

Most of his life Ford had considered Stan to be a practical man of fairly average intelligence. He had his charm and his wits and they served him well enough, but the Stanley Pines that Ford met between the worn covers of academic journals was different. He was still practical, but he had a biting sense of humor balanced well against a shrewd analysis of human behavior. And that was just in his most resent articles. Older more technical works displayed a similar analytical mind applied to complex mechanics, the results of which he found scattered about the shack when he knew where to really look.

The sheer body of work also shocked Ford. He had waded into the scattered hellscape that was his brother's office only to find that it wasn't as disorganized as he originally thought. Sure, weirdmageddon had thrown some things around, but the stacks of academic publications around the room were less caused by mess and more caused by a lack of shelf space. Ford had picked a few up to glance through them and was startled to discover that in almost every work there existed something of his brother. A full paper on the importance of tension in small-scale mechanical automatons here, a rebuttal against certain solar energy materials there, a half-started essay on tourist hive-minds spread out across the desk... page after page adding up until they filled a room with his brother's words.

Ford may have been an accomplished and celebrated scientist, but he had never been quite this prolific. He would ask later where Stan found the time and his brother would shrug, gazing out across the ocean without really seeing it at all.

“Thirty years is a long time to be alone, you have to find something to fill the empty days.”

The quiet resignation in his brother's voice made Ford's heart ache.

Thankfully, it didn't take the whole collection of papers to jog Stan's memory, only a select few. Stan took the initiative to skim through some of the older articles from time to time but he claimed that sometimes even he needed a refresher on his own theories. Ford mostly took his word for it, but he knew how good of a liar his brother was so he kept an eye out for signs of trouble. He was relieved when trouble largely passed them by... save for the occasional frustrated mutter as something minor slipped Stan's mind.

Now, Ford busied himself with his own projects for much of the trip to Oregon. Stan remained at the helm, staring resolutely out to sea and occasionally taking a few moments to jot down some ideas. By the time they reached their usual dock in Astoria they both had a fairly solid idea of their individual projects.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm bad at notes to be honest. I just really enjoy seeing the boys finally _finally_ relaxing on the Stan O' War II, tinkering and being brothers again.
> 
> As usual, I really love talking about Stan and Ford. Feel free to yell at me about them in the comments or on my tumblr (listed in my profile).


	4. Part 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day One of the Symposium dawns and the trio need to keep their heads down until their plan can be enacted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I posted this from mobile so if there are any weirdnesses I'm sorry XD

One day into the symposium Ford remembered why he'd never attended the stupid things in his youth. There were so many people positing stupid ideas and even stupider inventions. It was crowded and noisy and bright and Ford flinched every time someone bumped hard into his side. He did his single presentation on properly troubleshooting misbehaving wormhole technology, only losing a single pencil to the fathomless void in the process, then did a cursory circuit of the display floor before escaping back to his hotel room and crashing. His last feeling before passing out was strange bittersweet relief at having attended the much smaller Backupsmore instead of the sprawling behemoth that passed for West Coast Tech's campus.

Two days in he thought maybe he'd prefer the “M” Dimension as he watched some poor grad student stumble his way through presenting some kind of new microwave emitter. He'd never sat in on such utter nonsense in his life. Beside him, Stan twitched nervously and shuffled through his note cards. Ford had worried at first, but when he opened his mouth to offer advice, Stan had fixed him with a stony glare.

“I'm always like this, Ford.” He had said before turning back to his notes, hands shaking. “I'll shake until I get up there in front of everyone and then I'll be fine.” There was a long pause and then a humorless chuckle. “Used to shake like this before particularly hairy jobs and the early days of shack tours. Just gotta wait for either the adrenaline to settle or memorized routine to kick in. I bet if I gave the same lecture enough I'd stop shaking at these things.”

His eyes snapped towards the stage where the stammering kid was wrapping up. “Welp, I'm on. Wish me luck, Poindexter.” He clapped Ford on the back and then sauntered his way down to where the organizers stood waiting for him. Ford watched him take a deep breath and then grin as he stepped onto the stage, all traces of nerves gone.

His note cards stayed in his back pocket the whole time.

Stan's presentation was the only bright spot of the second day, which ended in literal fire and smoke as some researcher's AI project got a little too excited and overloaded the transformer that supplied the building. At least it was deemed an accident and would not overshadow the chaos that was to come.

The dawn of the third day could not come fast enough.

“Please tell me we're ready for launch in the morning,” said Ford as he lay sprawled across the foot of the uncomfortably lumpy mattress of the cheapest motel he'd ever seen this side of the multiverse. Honestly, if this is how West Coast Tech treated visiting researchers he would hate to know what the dorms were like. He may have dodged a bullet there.

Stan chuckled dryly as he stepped out of the bathroom, toweling off his hair. “Had enough? Surprised you made it this far, I thought you were gonna come completely unglued on day one.”

“Have a little faith,” objected Ford. “At least I didn't nearly punch one of the deans for being an insufferable asshole.”

There was a snort and then a wet towel hit Ford in the face. “Says the insufferable asshole.”

“Why you little...” Ford launched himself off the bed but a loud clearing of the throat interrupted the twins.

“I love a little tomfoolery as much as the next fella,” said Fiddleford as he pushed his way into the room, arms full of blueprints. “But we've got a heck of'a lotta work ahead of us if we wanna butter our biscuits a'fore tomorrow.”

Twin stares blinked slowly at him and he set the rolled up papers on the desk with a exaggerated sniff. “I dunno where y'all'd've ended up without my contributions. Everything on my end is tighter than a...”

“Please don't finish that sentence,” interrupted Ford, who had already heard it once in his lifetime and never wanted to hear it again.

Fiddleford snorted gracelessly but obliged. He sorted through the blueprints for a moment longer before turning back to the twins. “I've got all my bits n' baubles in place for the show tomorrow, what about y'all?”

Stan leaned against the wall, picking at his nails with an air of careless nonchalance. “Everyone likes freebies so I'm out of those little medallions I whipped up last week. They were gone within half an hour of being planted on the swag table. Slipped a bunch of the ones without casings into people's pockets too. I gotta say, reverse pick-pocketing has never been super difficult but everyone here is so far up their own ass I could probably shove an angry gnome down their pants and they'd never know.”

“Thank you for that disturbing mental image,” said Ford with a shudder. He had been the recipient of at least one gnome-based pants attack in his lifetime and he wouldn't wish that fate on anyone. “As for my end of the project, no one questioned having to set up a special antenna on the roof. There were a couple others doing the same so I won't look out of place when they check the security footage. I will need to get up early tomorrow to make sure the transformer issues didn't cause any unforeseen problems, but again... I doubt I will be the only one.”

With a disbelieving scoff, Fiddleford narrowed his eyes at Ford. “Pretty fortuitous that AI caused such a ruckus today, don'tcha think?”

The twins snorted simultaneously. “Of the three of us,” said Ford, relaxing back across the foot of the bed, “you're the only one who has successfully made a mechanical brain. Stan and I have never had inclinations towards creating artificial life.” A choking sound came from Stan's direction and Ford paused. “At least... I never had inclinations towards that. Something you would like to share with the class, brother mine?”

“Uhhhhh...” Stan rubbed at the back of his neck sheepishly and looked away from the other two. “I may have gotten a little too into Iron Man and tried to program my own Jarvis back when the first movie came out. That was around the time I started gunning for my last degree though, so the project got shelved pretty quick. All my notes and files might still be in my office at the shack though... maybe I could pull out the old boy and see if I can salvage him...”

“Not right now you don't,” said Fiddleford firmly. “Let's just chalk the AI up to misbehavin' tech and go ahead as planned.” He checked his watch and whistled through his front teeth. “We got time to grab dinner and then we'd all better head to bed. Gotta start earlier than the rooster if we wanna pull this off.”

Ford pulled a face but Stan punched him gently in the shoulder, smiling face split by a yawn. “Not all of us are night owls, Poindexter. The earlier you go to sleep the earlier you can go check your antennae and we can get this show on the road. I swear this school is giving me a rash.”

“That would be these sheets,” griped Ford, but he let his brother and best friend lead him away to pick up dinner.

They ran through their whispered plans one more time over take out Chinese and generic gas station beer. Stan kicked back in the corner with a can in hand, watching the other two squabble over nuance with a fond gleam in his eye. The conversation lulled and he took a sip of his drink, eyes flicking away to stare at the wall.

“This is nice, ya know.” He said, suddenly fighting the urge to look back. “I did a lot of my grad work by myself, nobody really wanted to work with the late-blooming fuckup that ran a hokey tourist trap in the middle of bumfuck nowhere. I just wanted to tell you guys...” He paused and swallowed, forced himself to look at his co-conspirators. “If for whatever reason this doesn't work out tomorrow... I'm glad you included me. It's been fun to be involved and not just... on the outside looking in on the weird science bullshit.”

Ford blinked, startled, at him before pushing out of his chair to stand before his brother with a frown and crossed arms. “Stanley. Look at me, please.” Stan had slammed back the rest of his drink and sat with the empty can dangling between his fingers. He shook his head and Ford huffed out an exasperated sigh and tried again. “Stan. This project wouldn't be possible without you.”

He knelt down in front of his brother and pulled the empty can from his fingers. “It might have been my idea to come over here and destroy the place but I don't have the kind of mechanical expertise you and Fiddleford have. I can rig up all kinds of signals and build the larger constructions and break the laws of physics but I can't effectively read how people are going to react to certain situations. This plan will work out one way or another tomorrow and your contributions will be equally important in it's success.”

Stan lifted his head just far enough to smirk at his brother. “There you go with big words again, Poindexter. You know I have no idea what you mean.”

“You... you used 'phenomenology' in a sentence the other day completely unironically, you have no room to talk.” Ford was warming up to his subject, pushing himself back onto his feet and pacing about the small room. “I can at least follow you when you're discussing your absurdly tiny mechanical projects but you spent half an hour last week ranting about 'the collective consciousness of tourists in liminal spaces' and I had to spend the rest of the day figuring out what the fuck you were talking about.”

Stan opened his mouth to protest, but Ford leveled a glare at him and he snapped it back shut. “It wasn't so much about including you as it was a joint project in the first place. Every one of us has our own piece of the puzzle that wouldn't be possible without the work of the others. If anything it should be me thanking you for joining in.”'

Fidds hummed an acknowledgment from where he still stayed hunched over blueprints on the other side of the room. “Tell ya what, Stan. I'd be a might bit more stressed if I didn't have your behavioral pattern maps to reassure me that I'd placed all my little fellers in the right spots.”

“It sounds wrong when you say it like that.” Stan shuddered but the smile across his face was good-natured. With a grunt he hauled himself out of the low chair and made his way across the room, pausing to lay a heavy hand on Ford's shoulder. “I'm tucking myself into bed, not all of us are built for allnighters. Please try to get a couple hours of sleep?”

Ford said he would make no promises, but within an hour all three men are fast asleep, visions of blueprints and diagrams dancing through their dreams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The boys careful planning will bear fruit at last. I just wanted to talk a bit about Ford seeing Stan in an academic setting.
> 
> As always I love talking about these old men! Drop a comment below or come yell at me on tumblr!


	5. Part 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The long awaited final day of the symposium arrives, what do our boys have in store for West Coast Tech?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the longest chapter at just over 3k words. I tried to split it into two multiple times but it just works better as a coherent whole.

The next day was every single kind of perfect chaos that the three scientists privately relished and publicly denied.

Stan rose before the sun, as he had for many years and continued to do even into retirement. He spends a few minutes calmly brewing coffee in the pitiful double-cup percolator that looks like it hasn't been serviced since the 90s, more concerned with the caffeine boost than the probable sanitation issues. Finishing his own mug, he sets the coffee to brew again and turns back to the other two figures sleeping in the room.

Fidds is sprawled across the old armchair in the corner. He'd told the twins that the elevation felt better on his back than if he slept in a bed, habit and all that. Ford had balked and tried to bunk with Stan to give his friend a whole bed to himself but Stan had refused. First of all, he was aware of how much the both of them sprawled, they'd end up shoving each other onto the floor in about five minutes. Second... Fidds was probably right about his back. Stan had seen the inside of his shack in the junkyard years ago, it didn't have a bed in sight.

Probably best not to dwell on all of the possible reasons why.

Frown tugging at his lips, Stan looked over to the other bed where his twin lay sprawled out on his back, limbs going every which way under every spare blanket they could wheedle out of the hotel. He felt his lips quirk upwards in an amused smile that grew mischievous even as he approached the bed.

With a yell, Stan whipped the covers back, exposing his brother's hideous flannel pajamas to the open air. Ford's eyes snapped open and he sat up, scrambling under his pillow for the gun Stan knew he kept there, breath heaving for a few seconds before he squinted at Stan and groaned, collapsing back into his pillows.

“Really, Stanley?” Ford's voice was sleep-drunk and piteous. “I could have _shot_ you.”

Stan snorted. “Nah, I made sure your extra-dimensional laser pea shooter wasn't anywhere near your bed before you passed out last night. Check again.”

Ford groaned even louder and Fiddleford woke up to the sound of a under-ripe banana smacking Stan in the face.

Breakfast that morning was a hurried affair consisting of grabbing more coffee and some granola as they hurried past the breakfast buffet and out the front door. Brisk fall morning air struck the trio in the face and while Stan and Fidds merely grunted with sudden discomfort, Ford grimaced and pulled his heavy jacket closer to himself. He hated the cold. It reminded him of the empty void between dimensions and the bitter wind of some of the harsher climates he had found himself stranded in over the years.

Sometimes he regretted setting up his permanent home in Oregon.

Fortunately the cold was soon forgotten in the scramble to get prepared for the busy day ahead. Reaching the convention center the three split off into different directions: Ford to the roof to double check the antennae one last time, Fidds to make sure all the small parts of his contribution were still in place, and Stan to casually tamper with a few safety protocols before striking up a riveting yet distracting conversation with the single member of the board that was just as much an early bird as they were this auspicious morning.

“Dr. Pines!” Ford was just finishing up the diagnostic and groaned as a fresh-faced graduate student bounded up to him. “I was hoping to catch you at some point this weekend, do you have a moment?”

Ford looked at the slowly ticking status-bar and decided, _yeah sure, why not. I have a few minutes before I'll know how much that AI fucked us._ He turned to the kid with a bland smile. “What can I do for you?”

“I wanted to tell you how much your work on human consciousness as it relates to multiverse theory has influenced my personal view on the meaning of the web of human society and how we as a culture have a responsibility to...” The kid stopped short, taking in the blank and startled look on Ford's face. “Dr. Pines are you alright?”

“Sorry,” he shook his head to dislodge his thoughts. “I'm afraid you have the wrong Dr. Pines. I'm assuming you are looking for a 'Lee' Pines? I think that paper was before he got all the name confusion figured out.”

The kid blinked at him for a moment, eyes flicking down to his guest lecturer badge and then squinting at his face. “Uhh...” they said eloquently and Ford took pity on them. He remembered those post-grad days of brain-fog and confusion well. Not fondly, but well.

“You're looking for my twin, Stanley. I'm Stanford.” He glances down at the status bar, only a few seconds left. “He should be down in the exhibit hall right now if you wanted to catch him before the end of the symposium.”

Eyes lighting up the student beamed at him, “Twins?! That makes a lot more sense! Some of the others thought maybe someone had opened an unconstrained wormhole again and caused another doppelganger incident.”

Ford opened his mouth to ask and then his diagnostic beeped softly at him. With a muttered curse he glanced down and felt his shoulders sag with relief as his readout came back negative for AI interference. He pocketed the devise and reached out to clap the student on the shoulder, “Come on then, I'll take you down to meet him. I'm sure he'd love to discuss his sociological theories with someone who isn't completely mired in inter-dimensional physics.”

On their way through the building the pair ran into Fiddleford, straightening his bowtie in the reflective glass of a windowed wall. He jumped just a bit as Ford cleared his throat behind him.

“Ah, Stanferd!” He spun around, eyes flicking to the grad student. “You seem ta have acquired a shadow. Diagnostics look jim-dandy or do we need ta delay?”

Ford waved the diagnostic device at his friend. “I am all set to go. My shadow is actually just following me to find Stanley. He seems to have a small academic following of his own now.” He couldn't keep the pleased pride out of his voice, Stan deserved to be recognized for his hard-earned achievements.

Fidds chuckled. “I've been trying to tell him that for years but no one listens to the town kook. Just cause I lost my marbles for a while doesn't mean I can't appreciate a good academic journal.”

From their spot slightly behind Ford, the grad student gasps. “You... you're Fiddleford McGucket! My roommate is doing his dissertation on your brainwave simulator!”

“Well butter my buns and call me a biscuit,” said Fidds, shoving his cap back to nervously scratch his head. “That ain't nothing special. Wait until he gets a whiff a...” Ford shot him a look and he trailed off with a cough. “I got other things in the works that'll make that look like a punchcard calculator. Tell me though, what did your roommate think of the binary realtime variables for conscious thought...”

Ford tuned Fiddleford out as they approached the exhibit hall. Stanley had set up his display towards the middle of the room, “optimized for maximum contact based on human behavioral patterns.” When pressed on whether that was the con-man Stan or the researcher Stan thinking, he had shrugged and said “why can't I be both?” Much like the shack, Stan's booth was a eclectic mix of animatronics and thinly disguised social experiments. Unlike the shack though, everything at the booth was meticulously labeled with proper use and why it worked. A large cross-section of some of Stan's delicate mechanical work took up most of the space, different parts mapped out on cardstock in his brother's blocky handwriting.

Stan was leaning on the table like it was the counter in the shack when the group strolled up, casually explaining some small spring-and-gear detail to a couple members of the board. Ford smirked as he realized that Stan had assumed his Mr. Mystery persona and while he wasn't selling the board complete bullshit... he was certainly trying to sell them something. The congenial smile on Stan's face only grew wider as he noticed his brother slide in behind the board members.

“... and that's how I took the potential energy of this one spring and generated enough power to charge a cellular phone for a week. I'm fuzzy on the transmission details though, those were my brother's contribution to the project. Hey, Ford, wanna fill them in or did you need me for something?” The look in Stan's eyes smacked of pleading desperation and Ford bit back a chuckle.

“Sorry, gentlefolks, we have a full day planned and need to get ready. I would be happy to discuss our project at some other point in time.” He whipped out a few business cards Stan had insisted they carry and handed them out before shooing the board members on their way. There was a little token grumbling, but not much as one of them spotted the coffee stand on the far end of the hall turn on their open sign.

Stan sagged with relief. “Thanks, Poindexter. Thought they'd never leave.” He nodded at the wide eyed grad student hovering behind Ford. “Who's your friend?”

With a chuckle, Ford nudged the kid forward. “You've got some adoring fans, Stanley. This one mistook me for you and tried to talk to me about... what was it again?”

“H.. human consciousness and mul... multiverse theory, Dr. Pines,” the kid stuttered out, and Stan blinked at them for a moment before tossing his head back and laughing.

“I haven't thought about that train wreck of a dissertation since 2010, kiddo.” He turned to look at his brother and Fiddleford, still grinning. “You two geniuses got everything you need? It's not every day I get to talk shop with inquiring young minds and I can watch the chaos unfold just as easily from the coffee-shop.”

Ford frowned, eyes flicking towards the grad student. “Are you sure? You've put so much work into it...”

“It's not _my_ revenge, Sixer.” Even after three years they both flinch as the name slips out. “Anyway, my part's already done. Remember?” Stan pulled a medallion from his pocket and flipped it in Ford's direction. He caught it and stared at it's smooth unassuming face.

“Why did you keep one?” Ford hissed out, startled.

“Eh, that one's a dud. Souvenir ya'know.” Turning his head, Stan made eye contact with the grad student. “You didn't hear any of that just now. Lets go grab some coffee and I'm gonna pick your brain about that god-awful dissertation. I could use a fresh perspective.”

With that, Stan steered the stunned grad student in the same direction the board members had gone moments before. Ford watched them join the growing line for coffee with a smile that was halfway between amusement and a grimace.

“He's right you know.” Ford jumped slightly as Fiddleford materialized at his elbow. “He did all the major legwork the first two days, he deserves to kick back and watch the show. Come on old friend, we have a campus to raise to the ground.”

\-----

The hard part was the timing, waiting for the room to fill with attendees but not so full as to be dangerous. After that, everything was out of their hands.

It is supposed to go something like this: Ford presses a button, the button sends a signal to the antennae on the roof which boosts the signal to all the little wireless transmitters slowly gathering potential energy from the pockets of unsuspecting symposium attendees, which then bounces the signal to a myriad of small mechanical dinosaurs scattered across the conference center, they cause havoc for a little while and then mass together at a predetermined location to form an Ultra-Mega-Dino to rampage across campus until dissolving into smaller dinos once again outside of wireless token range.

Oh also the medallions would be playing the soundtrack to Jurassic Park the whole time. But with terrible kazoo accompaniment, courtesy of Mabel.

It was a ridiculous plan, using all of Stan's social pattern analysis, all of Fiddleford's mechanical genius, and all of Ford's understanding of signals and radio waves. Also encryption, you could never encrypt your signal data too much. It was a ridiculous plan and Ford is almost disappointed he didn't think of it earlier in life.

That disappointment fades into a childish glee around half an hour later as he sees his brother, settled in at a cafe table, raise a mug in a silent toast from across the exhibit floor of a _West Coast Tech Symposium_. He nods back and presses the button.

All Hell Breaks Loose.

There's a rumble, a mechanical whirring, and then the exhibit floor erupts in hip-high mechanical dinosaurs assembling themselves out of fake floor panels and crawling out from under display tables as hundreds of pockets start blasting the haunting and unforgettable sound of several out of tune kazoos. Given the wind up nature of the medallions not a single one is perfectly in sync and Ford finds himself having to grip a table for support as shaking laughter overtakes his body.

A beat of stunned bewilderment overtakes the hall and then the screaming starts.

It's a rising shriek of terror accompanied by the pounding of feet as people run for the exits, only to find most of them blocked from the other side. The robots seem to follow people, never getting too close but definitely stalking individuals across the busy floor. They're roaring and lashing about but pretty soon it becomes apparent that while they're chaotic they don't appear... dangerous? The damage is done, however, the exhibit floor seething with a mass of people primed for panic and excited mechanical raptors.

In the cafe seating area Stan sips his coffee calmly, smirking into the mug as his new excitable grad student friend stares wide-eyed out into the chaos. A few tables over the board members stood up so quickly their chairs clattered backward onto the floor and they gaze sharp-eyed over the crowd, mouths hanging slack in either anger or astonishment.

“Well,” Stan slams back the rest of his coffee and hauls himself to his feet. “I'd best shake a leg or Fidds'll have to play pied piper all by his lonesome.” He turned and held out a hand to the grad student. “Sorry we didn't get to talk more, kid. You've got a good grasp on my theories.”

The student takes his hand and shakes it. “That means a lot, sir.” Their eyes flick out to watch a woman run past, papers clutched to her chest and three raptors on her heels like large metal puppies. “If anyone asks, you were talking to me the whole time this went down. We have witnesses after all.”

Stan throws his head back and laughs. “We sure do! I like your spirit, kid. We should definitely continue this conversation some other time.” He patted down his pockets and then grimaced. “Ugh, I guess I gave out all my business cards already. I've just got... oh, this'll do.” He pulls out a flashy yet terrible business card that does not look like to belongs to any respectable researcher. “Here's a card for my old business in Oregon, you call them and they'll be able to get you my contact info if you ever need to pick my brain about a theory or anything like that. Ask for 'Stan' though or they're likely to hand you off to my brother instead.” He glances over his shoulder as the whirring of mechanical parts behind them gets louder. “You better get out of here. Main door by the loading bay should be unlocked, but someone is bound to figure that out soon.”

Stan wraps the grad student's hand around the glossy card and gently turns them towards the exit with a soft shove. They take the hint and shove the card into their pocket while striding purposefully toward freedom. Stan grins as he watches them weave their way through the crowd, stopping only once to pat one of the raptors on its smooth metal head. Then they duck around a corner and are lost from view. With a roll of his shoulders, Stan shifts his focus back to where he'd last seen his brother and is hit by a rolling wave of astonished surprise.

Ford no longer stands in the middle of the room, instead he is charging towards the gathering point, raptors pouring behind him like giant metal ducklings. Perched on his shoulders, laughing with all the unhinged glee Stan has grown to appreciate is Fiddleford, waving his arms in the air and yelling. Stan catches a few words amidst the chaos: “follow me” and “metal progeny” and “scrabdoodle faster Stanferd, we have a deadline.”

This is not part of the plan.

Ford was _supposed_ to stay out of the way and Fidds was _supposed_ to be subtle about reaching the assembly area. Stan reaches up under his glasses and rubs the bridge of his nose in exasperation. He thinks he shouldn't be surprised given the old saying about “the best laid plans” but he'd honestly expected Ford to have some sense of decorum and self-preservation.

He shakes his head with a chuckle. This is _Ford_ he's talking about, the man who summoned a demon and is wanted in multiple dimensions for... well he's never quite elaborated but it's probably something really stupid. Wouldn't it be ironic if it was for inter-dimensional pug smuggling?

The metallic dinosaur roaring increases significantly in volume and Stan decides he should probably go check on the two idiots. He trades his ceramic mug for a paper to-go cup and wanders nonchalantly in the direction of a large seething mass of metal and wires that can be seen from clear across the room. While Fiddleford has always had a flair for the dramatic, this – a collaboration with Ford – is his finest creation yet. Based on Ford's research into the gnomes of Gravity Falls, the Mega-Dino writhes like a living thing as the smaller raptors meld into the growing shape. Stan remains a bit unclear on the specifics of _how_ exactly the metal is shaping itself like that but... honestly, Ford had started ranting about sigils and spells as a precise science and Stan immediately lost the plot.

All he knows is that this unholy abomination of science and magic has about as much brainpower as a hundred Labrador puppies and the mannerisms to match.

He feels a hard metallic surface bump against his leg and looks down to see one of the raptors has paused to look up at him. It makes a whirring noise very close to a whine. The bots aren't exactly sentient but they aren't just dumb programmed automatons either. This one had taken a liking to him early on, but he can't have it blow his cover now.

Stan raises his cup to his lips to cover his smile. “Go join your siblings, Junior. I'll be here when you're done.”

The thing fucking wags its tail and then runs off to literally leap into the pulsing magical mechanical amalgam. Stan glances around to see if anyone saw him talking to it, but everyone seems focused on the two figures delightedly urging their robot spawn along.

Stan shakes his head. The two dumbasses are going to get themselves in trouble... oh look, here comes campus security right on cue. He takes another sip of his coffee and subtly slides a couple steps backwards as the last raptor streaks past him into the two story tall form that is brushing the ceiling of the exhibit hall. It tilts its head back and releases a deafening roar before smacking it's tree-trunk size tail against the ground with a jarring thud.

To their credit, campus security barely bats an eye, but Stan can see the barest hint of a tremor in their shoulders. Ford and Fidds still have their backs to security and Stan could call out to warn them but he's pretty sure he still has outstanding warrants in the state of California. False name and a much younger appearance, sure, but it would be all over if he had to get fingerprinted. Besides... they did make a several ton, magical, dinosaur shaped destructo-bot that at this very moment is turning to crash through the glass wall of the conference center and out onto campus proper.

Stan backs up until his legs hit a display table and then turns around and strolls back to his booth to pack up. The last thing he hears before the enthusiastic roaring outside drowns everything else out is the angry voice of campus security arresting his brother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mayhem! Madness! Robot Dinosaurs possibly powered by magic! What more could the mystery trio ask for?
> 
> Epilogue coming up soon!
> 
> (Also don't worry, Stan didn't abandon his brother. They had a long talk about what to do if security got involved and it was decided in no uncertain terms that Stan was to stay as far away from the law as possible.)


	6. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Since Stan can't risk being found out by California's law enforcement, someone else has to come post bond for Stanford and Fiddleford. That someone else is none too happy...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are at the end! I had a ton of fun writing this and I hope y'all had just as much fun reading this.

Stanford and Fiddleford do not spend long in the county holding cells.

In fact, they spend less than 24 hours on hard concrete benches before the warden is unlocking their door and leading them towards freedom. He says something about someone posting their bail that sails right past Ford's overstimulated mind. Certainly the cells were more comfortable than some of the inter-dimensional jails Ford has spent time in over his sixty-plus years of life, but they were not the most pleasant of accommodations and he is relieved when he is ushered out into the bright sunlit parking lot.

He is less relieved when he sees who is waiting for him, leaning on the hood of the bright red Stanleymobile in a smart skirt suit with crossed arms and a furious glint in her eyes.

Ford leans over to Fidds. “If I say run, move as fast as you can and pray she's not wearing her running shoes.”

“I FUCKING HEARD THAT STANFORD.” A voice as stern and powerful as it normally is in the courtroom rings over the asphalt.

Ford wilts, “Never mind, it's too late for us, Fiddleford. Tell the kids I love them.”

“The robots or Dipper and Mabel?” Fiddleford asks, not even blinking as Shermie Pines storms across the parking lot, heels clicking sharply on the pavement.

“Both?” Ford feels his heart rate tick upwards as his sister draws closer. He knows there's a reason Stan shouldn't be within miles of the county jail but right now his fight or flight senses are kicked into overdrive and he can't focus. “Why is it Shermie and not Stan? Where's Stan, Fiddleford? Did you see him get out of the conference alright?” Panic tunnels his vision and the edges start to get fuzzy right before his twin's familiar head pops up on the other side of the Stanleymobile.

“Relax, Ford.” Stan laughs over the roof of his beloved car. “Do you think I trust miss 'too gay can't drive' with my baby?”

Shermie freezes in her furious stride to level an unimpressed stare over her shoulder at Stan. “Don't think I'm not still angry at you for allowing this nonsense to happen in the first place, Stanley. Remind me again why _I_ had to be the one to post their bail?”

Under his sister's glare, Stan shrinks a little. “I have a warrant out for my arrest from the late 70s and if there was any chance of them fingerprinting me I'd be done for” he mutters under his breath.

“That's what I fucking thought.” Shermie turns back to Ford, leans in really close and Ford is _painfully aware_ of how tall his sister really is. “Get in the fucking car, little brother. We have a mess to clean up.”

Quietly, Ford and Fidds climb into the backseat, Shermie having claimed the spacious front seat by virtue of eldest sibling sprawling rights.

The atmosphere in the car is tense for several long minutes. Stan white-knuckles the steering wheel, clearly already having been on the receiving end of Shermie's infamous tongue lashings. Their eldest sibling calmly pulls a nail file from her purse, the quiet rasp the only sound breaking the silence. Ford can see her lips twitching, but he's not sure if it's amusement or anger.

“Here's what's going to happen,” she says as they pull off of the twisting backroads and onto the highway leading towards town. “We are going to go back to West Coast Tech, you are going to profusely apologize to the board members and promise to donate your time to repairing the damage your little _pet_ inflicted on the campus, and then because they are gracious hosts and don't want to lose my future services as a legal consultant they are going to not press charges.”

She turns around in her seat to fix Ford with a stony glare, nail file stilling. “Next time you get a prestigious invitation to a world renowned conference, no matter how much you think the host institution is a bunch of scams in a trench coat pretending to be a legitimate business... If the little voice in your head screams that you need to fix some decades-old injustice...”

Ford swallows hard as his sister bares her teeth in a frightening grin that reminds him of just exactly how she clawed her way to the top of the legal food chain.

“Don't.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THE END
> 
> I really hope y'all enjoyed the shenanigans of Professor Stan and company. If you liked this AU or wanna scream about grunkles, my tumblr link is in my bio and all my Professor Stan stuff is tagged "professor stan au". There's a high likelihood I will revisit this AU, so you can also watch for updates there.
> 
> A note on the tiny dinos: they were programmed to return to the Mystery Shack as sneakily as possible. There Ford will disenchant them so they can't reform the mega dino and people can adopt them. >.>
> 
> Anyway, Thanks for reading!
> 
> This is the end. I am going now. Goodbye. _Vanishes_

**Author's Note:**

> I'll post the next chapter soon! I hope you enjoyed this first bit.
> 
> I live for comments, please feed me I'm starving XD Also I muse about this AU a lot on my tumblr, which can be found in my profile!


End file.
